An awful silence lay over the sea. The terrible jubilant silence of a god revenged!
“And so all those well-known, long-tried voices were still! Never again would Eurylochus drain the full tankard in a kindly health.”
Ulysses bowed his head, and bitter tears welled up into his eyes.
“Never again would grey old Diphilos stand at the helm of the good ship, sending his keen eyes out over the sounding wastes. How the last mournful cry of Jamenos had echoed through the storm. Young, straight Jamenos who had approached the Cyclops with him, beautiful young Jamenos, with the bold eyes and curling hair! And there was old Perdix too, old Perdix with his grin and chuckle and his tales. Never would Perdix sit by the fire and make merry yarns any more. The little twinkling rat-like eyes were stark and glazed now. Perdix stood beside the livid river among the rushing spirits. He would have no jests now.”
He saw them all together, in peril, storm, and quiet weather. His trusty men! His dear comrades!
And now he alone was left, alone, alone, alone.
Perhaps Athene herself was still with him and had not even yet forgotten her wanderer. As the thought struck along his brain a faint blush of hope began to flush his pallid cheek.
He floated on and on. Dawn came, waxed strong, waned. Tremulous evening came like a shy novice about to take the veil of night. Night blazed in moonlit splendour once more.
And at the hour when night stands still and dawn is not yet, the waves, kindlier than before, carried him to the island of Ogygia, where he heard the sea nymphs on the shore singing him a fairy welcome.
Soft hands drew him from the deep, soft voices welcomed him; it seemed as if one queenly presence, a tall woman with golden hair which shone, towered among the rest, and he fell into a gentle swoon, a soft surrender to sleep.